Assistant Photographer: Lori Trussell

Full Disclosure: Lori is my best friend. We met as college freshmen and have been following each other around the country every since. Lori and I have worked together on an incalculable number of school assignments, projects, business ventures, and crazy ideas. And now we’re at it again.

Lori shooting under the aspens.

I started my Photography business about two years ago with a camera, a couple of lenses, my laptop, and a big pile of photography books. As it turns out, after considering an absurd number of career paths from jazz musician, to actress, to restaurant manager, to chemist, to public servant, photography was what I was meant to be doing all along. The last two years have been incredible because I feel like I’m getting to contribute to the artistic marketplace by painting reality as I see it. There’s something mysterious about a great piece of art, and by “great piece of art” I don’t mean just historically important paintings, 19th century symphonies, and Picasso (if he’s not too weird for you). If I’m honest, I’m much more interested in popular culture. Music, art, and movies get popular these days because they take you on an emotional journey, either by taking you through someone else’s narrative, or causing you to be introspective, or both. (One current song that does an amazing job of taking you through a range of emotions–whether they’re pleasant or not–is Eminem’s “Love the Way you Lie.” He expresses the kind of emotional intensity that a lot of us don’t experience in our daily lives…which I think is not only artistically valuable, but can also teach us things about ourselves through our emotions which might be harder to learn intellectually) I’m in constant amazement of the kind of power that art can have. I relish the constant challenge to make my work tell a story that in turn, conjures up a mood, whether that’s the joy and excitement that a couple feels on their wedding day, or the inspiring feeling we can get from looking at something breathtaking. This in one way, is why I’m so enthralled with Photography.

Photography, just like all other art, is experienced subjectively. In the same way that two people can hear the same song and one can love it and be inspired by it and the other can hate it and find it off-putting, a photograph can drum up feelings of amazing joy from one observer, just as another person finds it puzzling or saddening. In our many years working together, Lori has demonstrated an amazing ability to see the other side of whatever I am looking at, and this has been especially true with photography. I trust her intuition and her incredible ability to sense interpret the emotions and wishes of people she’s never met. Her insights make me a better photographer, and more so, a better storyteller. Lori will be joining me as a second shooter and assistant on many of my shoots in Denver and around the country in the coming year.